New news...A reading...

Hello everyone...

This year seems to be rolling a head in a very productive way.

On Saturday, May 31st, a short play of mine, Some Mixed Signals, will be read along with other one acts as a part of the Manhattan Theatre Source's new Writers Forum, of which I am a member.

The reading is Saturday, May 31st, at 3:30 at the Theatre Source located at 177 MacDougal Street (between 8th and Waverly Place.) And of course, it's free.

The other writers are going to be Elizabeth Urello, Pamela Yaco, and Bill McMahon. Great writers all, it should be a fun time.

The Theatre Source started the Writers Forum a few months ago, meeting on a weekly basis, in order to create a home for writers and to ultimately have a source for material to go into production. The exciting thing for me is to have a theater associated with a writing group. It’s important to realize for WHAT we are writing (the stage) and that it is not just happening in a vacuum (the stage is RIGHT next door to our room.) We hear people rehearsing, we see audience go into the theater. It’s a powerful reminder.

We don’t write in a vacuum, we don’t write for our desk drawers.

We write for us and for the audience to come.

So: come check out the readings, soon public readings will be a part of the Writers Forum, and later workshops and productions will follow…

Troubling Plays...

So. In my last blog I mentioned something about plays that give me trouble. I want to talk about that for a second. Or two. Or three. Now this is all about the FIRST draft of a play, I'll talk about drafting another day.

Sometimes a play comes out onto the page pretty well formed, no problems, easily done. That's a blessing. More luck. Well, a dash of preparedness, and bit of thinking, and then a bunch of luck as I'm writing that the whole thing seems to come together without much hemming and hawing.

Then there are the other plays that seem to come together mysteriously. Like stepping out of a fog they sort of arrive. That's not to say I sit back and just wait. I wish it were that easy. I have to keep plugging away at the play...writing scenes, doodling lines, thinking, writing...madness.

The trouble...well...let's talk about what trouble means: trouble is my confidence being shaken. And when it's shaken those ugly things start popping up: I don't know enough about my play, my play is boring, I don't know how the play is going to end and it will go on and on and on forever, and who wants to watch that.

Trouble.

The troubling plays begin with a tickle in the back of my lizard brain. They begin with an impulse that won't go away. An image or a feeling or a line. These keep returning and returning, perhaps each time bringing a little more information or just more questions. But the nagging prevents me from NOT writing about the image or the line, etc. I have to pursue the play, the characters. And it takes time. And patience.

Umbrella took me five years to write--pulling teeth slowly. A Thousand Yard Stare and New Horizons, both new plays of mine, have been in my head for over two years. They both circle my brain slowly, each time a tiny bit of information is revealed, or an idea on how to tell a story I don't know how to tell pops up...

It can be a battle. My conscious mind versus my sub-conscious mind.

Sometimes I'm convinced the play is even purposefully, willfully being obtuse in order to torture me. But I think that's just the story of a paranoid mind. But what if it were true? And my plays WERE out to get me...hm...

All of this is to say, however, as troubling as these plays are to create, I think they are my most rewarding. Not just in the final product, but also in what I learned on the way towards the final draft. The mistakes, the wrong paths, the experiments gone wrong, all eventually become solid choices, the right path and the experiments that glow.

I just wish I could do it in my first drafts.

Where DID Dar and Matey come from?

There's a lot of Dar and Matey fans out there. I know, because I'm one of them. Where did The Lunar Adventures of Dar and Matey, Estuary Pirates, Episode Two: Danger in 1/6th Gravity come from?

And ultimately, where DO my plays come from?

Generally, I start with an image or a hook that gets me excited to start writing.

With Dar and Matey, I got an email asking if I would be interested in writing a play for a dark night series. I was in the middle of writing a play that was really challenging me...it happens...I'll write about that another day...I'll just say this: each play presents it's own unique challenges and you have to choose to rise to it or not.

So. I said yes. I'll write a play for the dark night series.

And now, I needed an idea.

Two things came together in my head...one...Dar, see the above photo. Dar is a coconut that I bought in Mexico this past January that had been cut and painted to look like a pirate. Now. I've always been interested in pirates. Who isn't? (And this was before Pirates of the Caribbean.) I thought the coconut was hysterical. When I got home, it went right on the book shelf staring at me. I named him Dar...to some amusement in my home.

And the other thing that went on in my head: I wanted to do a play that was just adventure. No reflection, no belly button staring, no single set. I wanted adventure. In the 19th Century they used to do plays that had volcanoes erupting, floods, earthquakes...the things that seem only reserved for film nowadays. At some point, theater turned away from telling those stories.

So. Coconut head meet a Desire. Mix. Blend.

A lot of my plays come from a collision of ideas and things I bump into. Forms, images, words overheard, they all come together during the process of creation. Each process is unique. With Dar and Matey, it came a desire to tell an action-adventure story on stage and an object. Umbrella began with the image of two people walking late at night. And with another play, On the Night of Anthony's 30th Birthday, Again, it began with the idea of writing a single door farce.

And that's the exciting thing: I have no idea where a nugget for the next play or screenplay might come from...I have to keep my eyes and ears open...

Dar and Matey on STAGE!

So, I went to a run through last night of my short comedy The Lunar Adventures of Dar and Matey, Estuary Pirates Episode Two: Danger in 1/6 Gravity. It was awesome.

The play itself is a silly adventure romp about two pirates who have been transported to the Moon and in order to get back to the Earth have to help King Kuna Luna get his daughter back from the Terrible Titian on the Moon Tim.

Stolen Chair Theatre Company is putting it on as a part of their show The Accidental Patriot. They are putting up on their dark nights short plays that are in theme with the show.

Emily Otto, an Associate Artistic Director, asked if I would be interested in writing a show for their dark nights and I jumped. I had been working on a new play and it was giving me problems, so any opportunity to NOT work on that and work on something else was not to be missed.

I wrote it quickly and emailed it. Now...not to pat myself on the back, but I think the play is hilarious. Sometimes, though, what I think is hilarious, isn't to others. (That's because they are wrong...but that's a blog for another day.)

Anyway. Deepti and I snuck into a run last night. And it WAS hilarious. The cast are having a lot of fun with this silly adventure. Serious fun. They are playing hard and it works, it really really works. It was great to see.

I hope you all get to check it out...it runs May 7th and 14th...click here for more information.

And ALSO go see Stolen Chair's The Accidental Patriot.... I know I am...

Bull!

My mom and dad came to New York City for a few days, to come and see my show.

You remember, I got a show going on? (Check it out soon, it's in the final week!)

They were only here for a few days, so we tried to pack in a lot. My mom was feeling better after X number of surgeries on her back...I could here it in her voice when I talked to her on the phone, she had her energy back. And it was nice to see, after a few years of having terrible pain.

We tried to get in the Statue of Liberty...and it was a PERFECT day to do it...of course, everyone else thought the same thing, so there was an hour and a half wait to get to the Statue. So, we did the next best thing...We went to Staten Island.

It's a free trip.

Over there...well, we didn't see much. Is THERE much on Staten Island? We did see...what they called a museum...but was really an abandoned lighthouse factory. The buildings were falling apart...which was sort of heartbreaking...they must have been so beautiful once.

Staten Island done.

Next. The Bull on Wall Street. That's the picture. We sort of had to fight to get it taken...French Tourists were putting their kids on the Bull's head, as Japanese Tourists were getting their pictures taking with the Bull's balls. A metaphor? If so, it's bigger than me.

Lunch, nap. Then dinner with my Uncle and Aunt.

Next day...Central Park. Another perfect day. At least we didn't have to wait in line to get in.

Flowers, trees, castles, ponds, musicians and hotdogs. Awesome.

Then, they saw the show and packed up and went back home...soon, they are going to Sweden for two weeks, while I continue to slave away here in New York...

(I have to apologize for this blog...there wasn't much meat to it. Just a laundry list of stuff that happened. It wasn't very good. You know it, I know it. Let's just move forward and hope that the next blog is better.)

Enterprise sucks.

Enterprise. The car rental. Sucks.

I was going to rent a car from them here in Harrisonburg, VA to drive back to Reagan National airport...they were going to charge me a drop fee. Of a dollar a mile. About a 150 bucks.

Was this on the internet? No.

Did we rent the car? No.

There's a Hertz in town.

So, I'm in Virginia

So, the wife and I are in Harrisonburg, VA. She's here to do some work, you know, the kind that pays you money. She's going to be one of the voices on Rosetta Stone's new Hindi computer program. Me...well, I'm tagging along for a few days, getting out of the hustle of New York...I traded it for the hustle of Harrisonburg, VA.

Except. There's no hustle. No hustle at all. And no bustle either.

It's sorta nice. There's not much to do...except shop. Eat. Walk around...where people say hello to you. And smile. Well, I think it's smiling, it's what I remember smiling to look like. I'm pretty sure it's smiling.

One of the things we did when we got here was drive over to Monticello, the home of one Thomas Jefferson. That guy. You know...writer, scientist, President, all around smart guy...when did we stop electing those types?

It was a beautiful drive over...winding through some small mountains, great views.

Monticello is...not what I expected. I thought it would be bigger. Well, the estate itself is big. But the house...is smaller than what I thought. The rooms aren't that big and they open up into each other, few hallways, it's room, room, room. Gorgeous, luscious rooms with views and light, but still...they aren't the mansions that we see today.

Still. Just to imagine that Jefferson and who knows who else walked these rooms, sat in that chair, died in that bed...Jefferson...who wrote the Declaration of Independence. This was truly a Founding Father...someone who really thought about Government, Freedom, what is is to be an American.

Perhaps we have exalted these Founding Father too much...but I don't know...as this election season keeps going on and on and on...and both parties look like idiots because they seem only in it for themselves and not the larger ideals, I keep thinking about the start of my country. The men (and women) not only fought a war, but, more importantly, thought. They had the intellectual rigor to ask the big questions, to debate the answers, to really try and make something that would last. It's lasting...but if we keep leaving the idiots in charge...

Also:
I don't know if any of you have been watching the John Adams mini-series on HBO, I haven't, but I caught the last episode here in the hotel. Now, SPOILER ALERT, when Adams and Jefferson DIE...bet you didn't know they died...they use Monticello. Clearly. It was so strange for me to see...the actor playing Jefferson, walking around the office and library...the same one the day before where I wasn't allowed to touch things. It was kinda cool.

And a bit of trivia. John Adams and Jefferson died the same day, the 4th of July on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.